第 51 页

Finrod was also acting as easy-going and lightly curious as he always did, another promise fulfilled, and Curufin felt appreciation well through him. Everyone’s been so weird this week. But you, at least, can be natural.

Finrod was slipping off his shoes. “Did you figure out that admin authorization error?”

“No.” Curufin scowled. “Stupid thing.”

Finrod cocked his head, raising an eyebrow. “You realize that accusing something you created of stupidity is, by extension, calling yourself – ”

“Don’t read too much into it.”

“Never.” Finrod dropped his bag on the floor with a pointed thump, and his eyes fell on the book by Curufin’s bedside. “That looks interesting.”

Curufin jabbed at a couple of keys, but the TYLPE function was still being stubborn and threw another runtime error. “Goddamnit. Yes, The Design of Everyday Things. Cory Doctorow reviewed it well, so I thought I’d add it to my list. I got it for Christmas from Father but I haven’t opened it yet.”

“Oh, Don Norman…Huh.” Finrod examined the book with interest. “Is it well written?”

“See for yourself.”

Finrod sighed and dropped down on the bed next to Curufin. “I’ve been grading midterms all weekend; I don’t know if I’m capable.” He rubbed wearily at the bridge of his nose. “I think my eyes might give out at any second.” He smiled slightly, looking over at Curufin. “Read me a passage?”

Curufin exhaled heavily. “You child.” But he set down his computer – my code needs to compile, anyway – and picked up the book. He opened it as Finrod stretched out next to him.

“The same principles that make these simple things work well or poorly apply to more complex operations, including ones in which human lives are at stake. Most accidents are attributed to human error, but in almost all cases the human error was the direct result of poor design. The principles that guide a quality, human-centered design are not relevant just to a more pleasurable life—they can save lives.”

A fly buzzed in the window, and the tree that pressed up against Curufin’s window scratched a branch repetitively against the glass. It was warm in the small room despite the cold day outside, and the light had an almost lazy quality to it.

Rather like the long figure stretched out on the bed next to him.

Curufin paused, not sure if he was annoyed or pleased by the way Finrod had rolled slightly against him so his shoulder pressed against Curufin’s thigh. “Do you want me to go on?”

“Mmm,” Finrod murmured. He shifted over and laid his head on Curufin’s lap. “Yes. You have a nice reading voice.”

Curufin quirked an eyebrow sardonically. “Ah, yes. A nice reading voice. Many talented am I.”

“You are.” Finrod’s lips parted in a smile, his eyes closing, as Curufin shook his head and read on.

“In design, it is important to show the effect of an action. Without feedback, one is always wondering whether anything has happened. Maybe the button wasn't pushed hard enough; maybe the machine has stopped working; maybe it is doing the wrong thing. Without feedback, we turn equipment off at improper times or restart unnecessarily, losing all our recent work. Or we repeat the command and end up having the operation done twice, often to our detriment. Feedback is critical.”

Curufin briefly had a moment when he was sure he could see, out of the corner of his eye, Finrod examining him closely, the ease gone from his face and replaced with a grimace of concern. But when he flicked his eyes down at Finrod he had only a faint smile on his lips, and his eyes were hooded and staring at something in the distance as he listened. Curufin told himself he’d been imagining it and returned to the text.

Soon he was as absorbed in the book as if he’d been reading it alone, and it was only when he broke off to say, “I had no idea about thermostats. Did you – ” that he glanced down and saw that Finrod was asleep. Curufin gazed at him, at the faint lines at the corners of his eyes; how they smoothed out as he slept. Cautiously, he reached out to touch a lock of Finrod’s fair hair where it fell over his brow. It was warm from the sun, and Curufin realized that really, Finrod was always warm. He let his hand drop from Finrod’s hair to brush down his neck to his shoulder. At his touch, Finrod stirred and reached up, eyes still closed, to take his hand. Their fingers, almost involuntarily, twined together.

“I guess you’re done with the book?” Curufin whispered, so quietly that he wasn’t sure Finrod could hear him. He wasn’t sure if he wanted Finrod to hear him, anyway. “I never would have taken you for someone with such a short attention span.” But even he could tell that his voice held none of the sarcasm of his words. His eyes drifted briefly to the laptop, its screen dark, on the bedspread beside him. This is the first time you’ve had all year to work on your own program. You should take advantage of it.

He reached out with his free hand and closed the laptop.

Curufin leaned back against the pillows, laying the book carefully on the blankets beside him. A warm feeling, a still feeling, a content feeling – as warm as sunlight, as warm as Finrod – filled him.

Finrod sighed and turned his face against Curufin’s leg, murmuring something inaudible, and Curufin, without thinking about what he was doing, squeezed Finrod’s hand gently. There were shadows under Finrod’s eyes, and for some reason the sight of them made Curufin frown, disconcerted.

“Shh,” he murmured. “Take a break for once, you overworked fool.”

Finrod sighed again, and relaxed against him. Curufin closed his eyes, his fingers still intertwined with Finrod’s. The sun shone on as the tree tapped patiently against the window, unheeded by the drowsing pair on the bed.

The words of the book ran lazily through Curufin’s mind before fading into half-dreams.

There is no need to sacrifice beauty for usability or, for that matter, usability for beauty. It is possible to create things that are both creative and usable, both pleasurable and completely workable…

… Art and beauty play essential roles in our lives.

Technology may change rapidly, but people change slowly. The principles, the examples, and the lessons of The Design of Everyday Things come from an understanding of people.

They remain true forever.

* * *

* * *

“Okay, if you could all stand in a line – a line – A LINE – Okay, clump is close enough – we can head over to the music area, and – oof, sh– ” Maedhros just caught himself from falling headlong into a filing cabinet, a prospect that would likely have put a sharp corner right into his eye socket, and managed to hold back a throughly non kid-friendly curse at the same time. He steadied himself and looked down at the small child wrapped around his leg. He lifted his foot experimentally. “Hey, buddy, you’re going to have to let me go now.”

“Nuh.”

“Yes, I think so. Look, your friends are all lined – clumped up at the door. Don’t you want to go sing with Miss Ría?”

“Nuh.”

Maedhros bent down and gently unwound the child from his leg. The child promptly curled into a ball and refused to look at him. “Hey now, we just had a really good time writing those poems and stories, didn’t we? You had a really good one about the pig and the pancakes…”

“Ye.”

“…and I think it could be a smash hit. Instant classic. You know all it needs?”

“Whm?”

“It just needs to be set to music! And lucky you, that’s exactly what Miss Ría is going to help you all with.”

The child uncurled slightly and fixed Maedhros with a suspicious eye. “Fr’rl?”

“For real.”

The child sighed and fully uncurled, holding out a sticky hand, which Maedhros took gingerly. The rest of the afterschool students – who ranged in age from kindergarten to fifth grade – were watching with a mixture of impatience and interest, though a couple of them had started whispering and kicking at each other.

Still holding the paw of his reticent charge, Maedhros waved a hand he hoped conveyed authority. “Onward, troops. To the music room!”

“St’wimme?”

As they headed down the hall, Maedhros had to bend down to hear what the child holding his hand was saying through a mouthful of sweater stuffed in their mouth.

“What was that?”

“Stay wimme, Mae?”

Maedhros smiled. “I think I can do that. But you have to listen to Miss Ría too, okay?”

“'K.”

-

It was past 6 o’clock, the last of their charges had been led away by parents picking them up after work, and Ríanellë was folding up her music stand and rolling up the carpet she’d laid out so they could sit in a circle while she led them through scales.

She carefully set her guitar back into her case and latched it with a sigh. “Ahh, I do wish I could use my banjo instead. Guitar has always been my weakest instrument.”

“Banjo would be a pretty different sound, that’s for sure.” Maedhros took the music stand she held out to him and stashed it in one of the tall upright cabinets that lined the walls of the school’s multi-use gym.

“I suppose we could work our way up to it. Say, do you think that kid who wrote the lyrics about the smiling skunk realized the amazing Beowulf allegory he was making?”

“You caught that too, huh?” Maedhros looked ruminative. “The fact that it included a character called Grundle really hit it home.”

“Either that or he’s making a song obliquely about the perineum.”

“You know, that’s exactly the joke my brother would make.”

“Not Maglor, surely.”

Maedhros paused, realizing they were finally touching on the subject that they’d been avoiding all afternoon. “Not Maglor, no,” he agreed. “But Celegorm definitely would make some kind of uh, taint joke.”

Ríanellë chuckled. “Oh, that Thor.”

Maedhros squinted at her. “Sorry?”

“It’s how I keep you all straight.” Ríanellë dug a clip out of her pocket and used it to pin her bangs back as she bent down to gathering up the sheets of paper left behind by the music class. “There’s Thor, and the Curufin – he made it clear he refused to be nicknamed – and Tall Dark and Broody, and you, the Ginger One.”

“If that’s going to be how you identify me you may get in trouble – it’s not a unique quality in this family.”

“Damnit. How about the Tall Ginger?”

“It sets me apart from the Identical Gingers, I suppose.”

“Seven of you. Right, I should have remembered.”

They each busied themselves with the cleanup for a few minutes more, before Maedhros couldn’t hold himself back anymore. He was rarely this confrontational, but – “You know, surely.”

“What’s that?”

“You know who we are. Our family. Our…father.”

“Ah.” Ríanellë straightened up, carpet over her shoulder. “Yes, I know who you are.” She crossed to the cabinet and slid the carpet away.

Maedhros waited, but she didn’t follow up on this, so he said, “And?”

“I guessed after Maglor mentioned he had six brothers, and then I asked Ecthelion and he confirmed.”

“Wait, he knew? He didn’t care? You didn’t care?”

Ríanellë didn’t answer him directly. “How long did it take you to realize what family I belonged to?”

“I knew as soon as I saw your last name.”

“You put two and two together a lot faster than your brother.”

“He hasn’t spent the same amount of time poring over legal documents.” Maedhros crossed his arms. “You really didn’t know about Maglor’s family when you first hooked up with him?”

“I really didn’t. Not, as I said, until the next morning when he mentioned how many of you there were, and I thought about the only other family I knew of with seven sons…”

“Ecthelion plays music with him.”

“He does.”

“And he knew?”

“Of course.”

Maedhros stared at her. “Why didn’t either of you… Do you just not care?”

For the first time, Ríanellë’s eyes flashed with a trace of fire. “Maedhros, we lost two uncles at Alqualondë; half my family worked in the factory. The past several years of my life have been wholly absorbed with that tragedy and the fact that both my parents lost brothers there. Do I care? Of course I care.”

“So you refusing to date him – was that because you realized whose son he was? Were you trying to punish him?”

She narrowed her eyes. “What kind of person do you think I am?”

“I don’t know what kind of person you are! But he’s my brother, and I don’t want him being yanked around because of a personal vendetta.”

Ríanellë was still staring at him, her dark eyes cold. “No. I didn’t reject him because he was a Fëanorion.”

“Why not?” demanded Maedhros. If I were you, I would have, went unspoken.

Something softened in Ríanellë’s face then. “Maedhros, my parents did not raise either me or my brother to be vengeful. What on earth could we accomplish with anger? What happened at Alqualondë was a tragedy, and should never have happened. But Maglor didn’t keep the doors from opening when they tried to escape, nor did he ignite oil canisters in the back. He wasn’t the reason they died, anymore than you were – or the rest of your crew of brothers.”

“My father wasn’t either.”

She smiled faintly and didn’t answer. “I don’t hold you responsible, and anger doesn’t do a great job in terms of helping grief, in my experience, it just wears you out faster. I told your brother the truth – I’m not dating him because I don’t want to date anyone right now.” Her mischievous smile was back, her cheery mien regained as swiftly as if they hadn’t just been speaking of an incident that had cost her family two lives, and Maedhros’ family millions. “And I’m especially not dating pretentious musicians.”

“You are a – ”

“Boy, do I know it.” Ríanellë pulled her leather jacket on and hefted her guitar strap over her shoulder. “See you next week, Maedhros.”

* * *

Caranthir tilted his head back, staring at the impressive ice fall in front of him, nearly 40 feet tall and a far more brilliant blue than the sky, which was currently slate grey and dropping thin, dry snowflakes on them.

“This is insane.”

Behind him, Haleth was busy fiddling with a carabiner, her heavy gloves stuck into her belt alongside an ice pick almost as long as her arm.

“What if it just, like, collapses?”

“It won’t.” Haleth checked her harness and gave an experimental tug on the rope, jerking Caranthir back several inches.

“Ouch.”

Health looked up at him and sighed. “Bro, you aren’t even in the right shoes yet.”

Caranthir looked down at his boots. “What’s wrong with these?”

“Mary and Joseph. How are you gonna spike into the ice with those blunt things?”

Caranthir waved his own ice picks vaguely. “I thought that’s what these were for.”

“You need them down low, too.”

“Down low? Like on my – ”

“On your feet, freak.”

As Caranthir sat down resignedly – and stiffly, in his three layers of clothes – on a hoar-frosted boulder and began to pull on the crampons Haleth had tossed him. As he fiddled with the crampons and tried to avoid stabbing himself, Haleth leaned against a tree and folded her arms.